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Telford death: family anger over inquest's suicide verdict
Telford death: family anger over inquest's suicide verdict
The shocking catalogue of threats and abuse suffered over two years
The costly, humiliating lessons that have brought change
Day after day, we heard how a happy-go-lucky father was turned into a man in fear of his life
Telford: The coroner's comments
Leading article: Harsh lessons to be learnt from a suicide in Telford
When Icyline McGowan arrives at Haygate Road cemetery in Telford each weekend she has not one but three fresh graves to attend to, each in adjoining plots.
Alongside her son, Errol, 34, found hanged after a campaign of racial harassment are her grandson Jason, 20, also hanged last year, and her husband, Edwin, who died of cancer last August without knowing the full facts of either of the previous deaths.
She says she is "sleeping with and waking with" the pain. And the hurt will not have been made any easier by the five weeks of evidence she has listened to at the inquest into the death of Errol, her "tender and caring" boy.
Peter Hampson, Chief Constable of West Mercia, said yesterday "how difficult it must have been for them to see all aspects of Errol's life examined under the forensic microscope". But the McGowans wanted the case out in the open. If it had not been for the family's extraordinary tenacity, the horrific story of Errol's death would have passed almost unnoticed.
Determined to expose the truth, they took the case to Jack Straw last year when he was Home Secretary and managed to secure the aid of Britain's senior police officer involved in race crime, John Grieve, in a re-opened investigation of both Errol's and Jason's hangings. Mr Hampson also felt obliged to make a public apology to them in April last year for the service they had received.
The quest for justice was, the family said in a statement yesterday, "an unnecessary and tortuous process", which would not have been required if the police had done their job.
The McGowans have been driven on by their sense of injustice that police failed to come to Errol's aid when he desperately sought their help. In a memorial booklet issued in the past month on Errol's birthday, his brother Clifton, a marketing manager who has led the family campaign, promised: "I will always be fighting your corner."
Throughout the inquest, the McGowan family has been a constant presence. Icyline took her place each day in the front row of the public seats. Errol's brothers and sisters took turns to sit behind the family's legal team, prompting lawyers with information pertinent to the evidence to be heard.
Yesterday's verdict was a painful one but one that the McGowans said they had expected but did not accept. Clifton McGowan said: "I personally was not surprised ... from an all-white jury, given the misinformation the police have given them."
The family said yesterday that West Mercia police had used the hearing to try to justify its original approach to the investigation and "reinterpret what was supposed to be a clear and genuine apology" from the chief constable. And the pain is far from over. The inquest into the death of Errol's nephew Jason, found hanged in similar circumstances, opens in November. Again, it is to be heard in the Moat House hotel and is likely to consider several weeks of gruelling evidence. For the McGowans, the grieving has fostered an even greater sense of unity among an already tight-knit family. They are finally coming to terms with the loss of Errol.
Last weekend, in Telford town park, his three young sons planted a tree in his memory on the second anniversary of his death.
The hawthorn tree, in the children's area of the park, was chosen because it blossoms into red flowers at the time of his birthday in June.
It carries a plaque with positive message of hope that will resonate with anyone who attended the inquest into his death, including the coroner, Michael Gwynne. It says: "This tree of my life leaves its roots, so that human harmony flourishes."
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